Here Again
by Fophelia1331
Summary: Frisk finds herself caught up in an endless cycle of resets with no way out or idea why this is happening. Only one other knows what is going on, but they've already given up. Frisk isn't far from joining them too. The only way to stop this has a heavy price. (Some parts based on Miranda Lambert's song, Tin Man.) (Short Story)
1. Chapter 1: Something Bound to Fall Apart

**Chapter One: Something Bound to Fall Apart**

**Frisk**

I open my eyes again. A glance around and I know I'm back at Alphys' place. Back at the sleepover after another random reset. Tears start to form in my eyes. I couldn't count how many resets I've been through, and one I didn't do at that! I made it through the Underground, befriending everyone. When I finally broke the barrier, I briefly made it to the surface before I woke on the buttercups again.

Eventually, I stopped trying to break the barrier. I know every monster wants to get back to the surface, but it didn't get me, or anyone, very far. Even once I stopped, randomly everything would reset to some point, also seeming random. The only other person who knew about this was Sans. At first, I think he blamed me. But know he knows that I hate the resets too.

"Hey punk, what's wrong?" Undyne asks, looking at me. I can't meet her eyes.

"I-I'm fine," I say, wiping the tears away.

"S-something must b-be wrong. W-what is it?" Alphys asks, concerned.

"You just don't understand!" I shout, getting up and dashing out the door. I run through Hotland, not caring where I'm heading, trying to clear my head. I only stop when I nearly crash into someone.

"Oh! I'm SO Sorry!" the orange and brown monster said. "We've met before, right? Kris, was it?"

"Uh, it's Frisk. But that's okay." I can't remember if I had met him yet in this timeline, but if I did, I know where it would have been. "I think we met at the art club."

"Oh! I'm so sorry! Hey, you don't look too happy."

"Well, I'm in a tough part of life right now," I responded.

"I'm sorry! How about I draw a picture for you! This time I'll make sure it comes out right," he assures me. I nodded and he got out a piece of paper and a pencil. He got to work right away, and after a while took out some colored pencils too. "It's done!" So Sorry says, handing me the finished drawing.

My eyes widen and a smile spreads across my face. The artwork was beyond excellent. He had drawn me, standing in a place that looked like Waterfall. I was holding a pink umbrella and standing right in front of a large puddle that shown my reflection. In my reflection, there was a girl standing next to me that looks similar. Her hair was a little longer and dark and she wore a green and yellow sweater instead of a blue and purple one. But the biggest difference was her eyes, which were bright red. In her place, not in the reflection, was an echo flower. So Sorry had signed in the corner, "SO Sorry".

"I love it!" I said, looking up to him. "Thank you!" I look back at the signature. "Um, is your actual name So Sorry?"

"No. It is really Samuel Ortiz Sorry, but I go by SO Sorry instead."

"That's cool!" I say, still smiling.

"Thanks, but I gotta go now. See ya! Bye!" So Sorry says, turning around and leaving. I stand there smiling a few moments before turning and walking to the elevator nearby. I walk in and press the button for Left One. I've never understood how the elevators work, but it isn't important. I tuck the drawing from So Sorry into my backpack.

Stepping out I walk up to the Lab door and raise my hand to knock. Then I bring it down and sprint off in the other direction. I just can't face then now. I run for a while, I don't know how long though. Eventually, I make it to a large waterfall with rocks falling with the water. I rush across the water, managing to not get hit, and walk down the small bridge to a secluded, sort of secret area. I sat right in front of the echo flower.

"Frisk! Frisk!" Some calls. I recognize the voice, but can't put a name on it. I look up, and see them.


	2. Chapter 2: I've Been on the Road

**Chapter Two: I've Been on the Road That You're On**

**Chara**

"Frisk! Frisk!" I call. She looks up at me.

"W-who are you? How do you know my name?" she asked, fearfully.

"You don't remember? Oh well. I'm Chara." I don't care enough to answer her second question. I have one thing I need, and I have to do this right. "You're having trouble with the resets, aren't you?"

"Well, yeah. I am."

"I know how to fix it, but I can't explain it." I can't explain it and get what I need. "I was the first human to fall down here. I also had a soul of determination."

"What? Asgore doesn't have any determination souls."

"That's because Toriel took my body and soul to the Ruins. Both decayed after a while. Well, if you ever want me, just call my name. Bye!" I say before disappearing from her sight.

Hidden from anyone and everyone's view, I travel through the Underground, trying not to remember the past. It took a while, but I finally made it to New Home. I couldn't help but remember some of my last moments. I was so stupid. I caused not only my own death, but Asriel's too. I practically killed my own brother.

Walking through New Home, and into the castle, I see Asgore watering some Golden Flowers. If only I could join him again. As I walk past him, he looks to where I was standing. It's like he knows I am there, but that's impossible. Trying to push back the sadness, I keep walking until I reach my destination. The room with the souls Asgore collected.

When I enter, Tess, the patience soul, and Azaa, the courage soul, appear in front of me.

"I've started my plan," I say. I know they can see me, any of the souls could anytime.

"Are you sure this is right?" Tess asks.

"Yes. We'll save the monsters and then I'll save you guys." I speak with confidence. If I don't, they surely won't believe it.

"And then you'll save her," Azza says.

"Yes," I sigh, "We'll save her too."

"We'll have to keep watch for what happens. You only have one chance at this, Chara. One mistake and this plan's ruined," Tess warns me. "And she won't know that you're helping her. She won't be happy for sure."

"Yeah, she won't be happy. But she won't be angry at me. I'll send her to you guys. Don't tell her what I'm planning though. Then she'll be angry."

"What if someone finds out once you have gotten it?" Azaa askes me.

"I'll be very careful."


	3. Chapter 3: You Never Want a Soul

**Chapter Three: You never want a soul**

**Frisk**

I stand up after Chara disappears. Thinking about what she had told me, I start walking back to Hotland. All of a sudden I feel something tap me on the shoulder. I jerk around and see it's just Sans.

"hey kiddo. i think it's time that we tell someone what's going on. i'm headed to the lab."

"Okay, I'm coming."

I grab his arm and he teleports us right outside of the Lab. Sans knocks on the door. It opens to reveal both Alphys and Undyne.

"There you are, Frisk! You scared us, running out so abruptly " Undyne says.

"well, it's probably not as random as you think it is. there's some stuff you guys need to know."

"W-well, c-come in," Alphys says, moving aside to let us in.

"What's wrong punks?" Undyne asks.

"Well," I start, "there has been something going on for a while. You wouldn't remember it though." I sigh. "Randomly, everything has been reset-" I get cut off by a quick flash of white before the world turns black.

I'm back at the sleepover again. "I know how to fix it," Chara had said. I know what I need to do. I stand up and walk to the door.

"W-what are you doing Frisk?" Alphys asks, confused.

"This is for you," I say before running out into Hotland. I keep going until I reach the hidden room behind a waterfall the once had the tutu I had found earlier.

"Chara? I need you," I say. Right away she appears in front of me.

"What do you need?" she asks.

"You know how to fix the resets?" She nods. "I want to give you my soul so you can fix it."

"It'll be painful," she says. "You'll be in the position I am in now."

"I don't care about the pain. I _need_ to do this. But I want to warn you. You may not want a soul. Life is harsh. But if you still want to help, go ahead. Take my soul," I say, courage filling me.

"Alright," Chara agrees. "But go to the room in Asgore's castle with the souls after," she whispers.

The pain starts out in my head, like a headache. But then it spreads to the rest of my body. I collapse to the ground and the world fades to black.


	4. Chapter 4: It Didn't Get Me Very Far

**Chapter Four: It Didn't Get Me Very Far**

**Undyne**

"W-why did she j-just run out like th-that?" Alphys asks, confused.

"I don't know, but I'm following that punk!" I shout, rushing to the door.

"W-wait! I'll call you and watch th-the c-cameras to lead you," Alphys says, taking out her phone.

"Okay," I say, pulling my phone and running after where I saw Frisk go. As soon as my phone rang I pick up.

"She's still in Waterfall. She just entered the darkening lantern room."

It took a while, but I finally found Frisk. Alphys told me she had stopped in the secret room behind a waterfall. When I made it to the waterfall with the secret room, something happened and I lost Alphys on the phone. But at least I had already made it to where Frisk was. I freeze, hearing what she says from behind the waterfall.

"But if you still want to help, go ahead. Take my soul," Frisk says confidently. Take her soul? Why? What happened that made Frisk want this?

"Alright," a strangely familiar voice replies. I just barely catch the last part as it is barely audible. "But go to the room in Asgore's castle with the souls after."

I run through the waterfall, but I'm too late. I see Frisk lying on the ground. But there isn't anyone else around.

"Frisk?" I ask, beyond worried. "Frisk?" I kneel down in front of her. I hold her limp body and feel for her pulse. She still has it, and a heartbeat too. But her eyes looked empty. They were open, staring straight ahead, but emotionless and lifeless. I only knew her for a short time, but I feel like I've known her for a lot longer than I did.

Suddenly I swear I saw a bit of red in her eyes. Life seemed to flood back into her.

"Frisk? What happened? Are you okay?" I frantically ask. Something just doesn't seem right though.

"I'm fine ... Undyne," she said. Was her voice that high usually?

"Who were you talking to?"

Her eyes widened and she glanced around. She jerks out of my grip and tries to run, but I block her way. "What's wrong, Frisk? Why do you keep running?"

She sighs, seemingly in defeat. "I'm not Frisk."


	5. Chapter 5: You're Feeling Empty

**Chapter Five: Every Time Your Feeling Empty**

**Frisk**

I open my eyes to see a dim, dark red light all around me. It disappears and I see that I am in the hallway in Asgore's castle, just outside of the room with the souls. Chara had told me to go there, but I wait a moment.

I feel weird. Not emotionless like I had expected, but still strange. I feel sort of light. I attempt to pull out my soul, but I can't. Chara definitely took my soul. Hopeful she can help with the resets.

Walking into the room, I see the same coffins for the bodies of the humans from the past and the jars of souls. Curiously, I check the coffin with the red soul on it. It is empty. Looking up, I am shocked to see someone else. Actually, several other people.

"Hello Frisk," says the one with bright orange eyes and long blond pigtails. "We've been waiting for you."

"H-how do you know who I am? Who are you guys?" I ask, semi-frightened.

"I'm Azaa. The one with black hair and cyan eyes is Tess. Imala is the one with purple eyes. Green eyed blonde is Jonathan. As for how we know you, we have a friend who's been watching over you."

It doesn't take too long for me to connect the dots. "By any chance is your friend Chara?" I ask.

"Yeah. I knew you'd figure most of it out on your own," Jonathan said.

"Are you guys, um, soulless too?" I ask uncomfortably.

"Nah, we're only souls," Imala replies. "Chara was the only soulless one of us, but she used to have a soul."

"How did she lose her soul? She said it decayed but is that even possible?" I curiously ask.

"Well, she never gave us the whole story, so parts of this could be wrong. Chara died from buttercup poisoning after trying to make a cake for Asgore. Her illness weakened her soul. After a while, her soul turned to dust," Tess explains.

"How are you guys even here? And can you just wander around the underground?" I ask, still a little confused by some of the soul stuff.

"We're technically spirits. As long as our soul still exists, we can't stray far from it. Chara, and now you, can go anywhere in the Underground since you don't have a soul," Jonathan says, smiling at me. "You can reveal yourself to anyone, or stay hidden. Except we'll always be able to see you." Was it me, or did that last part sound creepy?

"So … how come there are four of you, but six souls?" I ask, again somewhat uncomfortable and confused.

"Eh, Conner and Jesse didn't want to wait around for you," Imala says. "They'll come around eventually."

Suddenly, I hear a familiar female voice. I know exactly who it is, but I'm surprised that they'd be here. "I'm the captain of the Royal Guard! What's the worst you'd think I'd do? ... I can't explain! Just let me through!" Then she appears in the doorway.

Undyne.


	6. Chapter 6: Ever Felt One Breaking

**Chapter Six: If You Ever Felt One Breaking**

**Undyne**

She sighs, seemingly in defeat. "I'm not Frisk."

"Then who are you?" I snarl. "And what did you do to Frisk!?"

"Shoot," she, no it, mutters. "Well," it says louder," I tried for this not to happen. I can't explain it all." It pauses again. "I'm Chara, the first human to fall into the Underground. You don't need to introduce yourself, Undyne. I know who you are." How in the world does this girl who's supposed to be dead know who I am? She was way before my time too!

"I don't really care if you hate me right now, but I'm trying to help. If you want to find Frisk, go to the soul room in Asgore's castle," Chara says casually. Before I can get a word in, she runs past me.

I have a few options. Call Alphys and tell her what just happened. Go after that girl. Or I can go where she told me to. I don't even understand half of what's going on, so how would I explain to someone? And chasing that girl doesn't seem like it would go well. I'll have to go with the third option. Hopefully, this isn't some kind of trick that just makes Asgore think I'm crazy for randomly running into his castle and going to the soul room.

I run out through the waterfall and through Waterfall. This time, I remember about the Riverman, so I take the boat to Hotland. I pound on Alphys' door and she opens it quickly. I rush to the other door.

"I'll explain later!" I shout over my shoulder to the extremely confused Alphys watching me. Out through the rest of Hotland. Through New Home. I stop in front of Asgore's castle. What if Chara meant that Frisk was dead, and that's I'd find her soul there? No, I can't think about that right now.

I run in and through the familiar halls, not encountering anyone until I was nearly where I need to go. I nearly crash into Asgore. I could see the door. He seems extremely surprised, but then again, yeah this isn't even close to normal for me. If I had needed him, I probably wouldn't have been racing through the halls like this.

"Undyne? Why are you here? Is there something wrong?"

Wrong? A lot of stuff is wrong right now. "Look, I need to get to the room with the human souls that you've collected."

He looks even more confused now. "Undyne, what's going on? Why do you want the souls?"

"I'm the captain of the Royal Guard! What's the worst you'd think I'd do?"

"If there some problem, you can tell me. But I just don't understand what's going on right now." He was being really patient right now, but I really have no time for patience right now.

"I can't explain! Just let me through!" I run past him, and he doesn't follow. I step into the room and close the door behind me.

There's really nothing out of the ordinary here. The seven containers, six with souls, are against the far wall, thankfully with no red soul. I try not to look at the cyan soul. The soul of patience. _Her_ soul. On the left side of the room, there are seven coffins each with a picture of a different colored soul on them. I eye the closest one, with a red soul of determination on it. Gingerly, I open it up. It's empty.

Why did I even come here? Why did I believe that girl? I turn around and reach for the door handle.

"Undyne!" A voice calls. I freeze. "Turn around, Undyne." I turn around and my eyes widen.


	7. Chapter 7: Hey There

**Chapter Seven: Hey There**

**Chara**

I run past Undyne, hoping that she doesn't follow me. I run through Waterfall, hoping that no one comes after me. After a little, I stop and sit, leaning on the wall. I put my head in my hands. If I had acted sooner, this wouldn't have happened. If only I wasn't caught. Now I have to wait, and waiting increases my chance of being caught. If I'm caught, I'll have to reset. If I reset, Frisk might figure out. If Frisk figures out she'll figure out some way to tell that skeleton. If he knows that I'm a part of this, it will completely backfire. If it backfires-

"Howdy!" A voice says, interrupting my thoughts. I look up.

"Why hello Asriel," I responded.

"Well, this is an interesting place to find you."

"Look, I don't exactly have time to explain everything right now. By any chance could you steal the human souls without absorbing them? And beat someone who's headed over there now to them?" I know what the answer probably is, but I ask anyway.

"Um, I don't think that's going to really work, Chara."

"That's what I expected." I sigh. "I guess I might as well start heading over to the castle now." As I start walking, Asriel pops out of the ground every so often, following me. At least I'm not alone.

"What are you doing?"

"Saving our friends, family, and practically every monster. Except," I pause for a moment, "I can't save you. I'll do everything I can, but even if I can pull this off, I'll be in big trouble. Lot's of monsters will hate me. God, Mom will be upset."

"Chara, what is it that you're doing?" Asriel asks.

I sigh again. "You know the resets that have been going on?"

**Sorry that this one is short, but I didn't want to go to far into this part of the story in Chara's perspective. I don't want to give away what I'm planning *smirks*. Just so you know, in this Asriel is a flower. If he wasn't, that would just be weird. Well, see you in the next one!**


	8. Chapter 8: I'm Glad We Talked This Out

**Chapter Eight: I'm Glad We Talked This Out**

**Frisk**

Undyne was here? Why had she come here? Was she looking for me? I glance at the spirits. Tess was staring at the floor in front of her. Imala seemed to be … calculating something? Jonathan was smiling at me and Azaa was intently watching Undyne.

"Guys, what do I do?" I ask. Undyne turns around after a little while.

"Well, you can practically do anything you want. You have your own free will-" Jonathan explains smirking, only to be cut off.

"Appear to her. Explain what you can," Azaa says. Quickly, I glance back to where Tess was. She must have disappeared since I couldn't see her. Focusing my energy, I try to appear for Undyne before she left. She reached for the door handle.

"Undyne!" I call. She freezes. "Turn around, Undyne." Slowly, she turns toward me and her eyes widen.

"Frisk?" Undyne asks in shock. Oh gosh, what do I say? How much does she even know? "Frisk, what's going on?"

I sigh, this wasn't going to be easy. What do I say? I can't just be like, 'Hey, I traded my soul so this soulless spirit could stop the resets, which by the way have been happening a lot and not caused by me, but you don't know about them. So I'm fine, how are you?' Yeah, that wouldn't ever work with anyone.

"Well, i-it's a long story-"

"But only I know all of it," Chara finishes, walking in. I turn my gaze in her direction and Undyne whirls around to face her. "I have to work fast, so you two have your little reunion somewhere else."

"Huh? What do you need to do, Chara?" I ask, confused.

"Just leave her, Frisk. It'll all work out in the end," Jonathan says, before disappearing. All the other spirits were gone too. I would like to believe that everything will be alright, but I can't just sit there and wait for someone to do something. And I have a feeling there's something big here that I'm missing. Something huge, something very different than the resets that had been troubling me.

"No," I say, sort of to Chara, but mainly to Jonathan. "What's going on? It's bigger than the resets, isn't it?"

Undyne looks confused, but doesn't say anything.

"Yes, it's bigger. But why do you even care?"

"I want to help you, but I need to know what really is happening," I tell Chara.

A flower pops out of the ground in between us. "I want to help you too, Chara," he says.

**Okay, another shorter one, but I promise the next chapter will be more interesting. Now, fun fact: I was going to just have Undyne and Frisk talk, and Chara come once Undyne left. But I changed my mind thanks to riverraiden, I decided that Chara and Flowey/Asriel should come and join the "party". Welp, see ya in the next chapter!**


End file.
